For many years, actual tin cans have been used as targets, especially for target shooting with rifles and the like. Usually the tin cans are ranged along the top rail of a rail fence or the like and the shooter stands some distance therefrom and takes his turn among other shooters to see how many cans can be shot from the rail before he misses and the next shooter takes a turn to shoot at the cans.
Shooting firearms has become a sport restricted to rural areas and such restrictions seem to be continually tightened so that the sport is diminishing.
Target sport of a similar type also has been popular for many years at fairs, amusement parts and the like by providing standing objects of different kinds at which baseballs and other types of projectiles are thrown in an effort to knock them over and hopefully receive a prize of some kind. Amusement of the foregoing type also has been reduced to the field of toys and games, particularly for purposes of associating with the target shooting member a score indicating means for purposes of rendering the game of a competitive nature by a number of contestants, and typical examples of games and amusement devices are found in the following patents.
U.S. Pat. No. 817,401, to Stoltz, patented Apr. 10, 1906, pertains to an amusement device in the form of a figure mounted on the upper end of a pivoted bar and when the figure is hit with a projectile, the bar and target move by gravity against the complex apparatus for purposes of releasing a ball or simulated egg-actuating gate means and causing the same to run into a trough.
Another U.S. Pat. No. 1,749,689, to Baum, dated Mar. 4, 1930, illustrates a toy target having a plurality of circular target members that can be struck by a suitable projectile and then pivotally dislodged from its perch at the top of a board and upon falling rearwardly, the target member causes a scoring member on a depending tail to be placed in viewing position adjacent to an opening in the supporting board while the target member actually falls behind.
Another prior U.S. Pat. No. 2,002,600, to Bull, dated May 28, 1935, shows a number of target members having angularly disposed score indicating panels connected thereto and, when the target member is knocked from a vertical position, the scoring member is brought into viewing position.
As an example of a target device capable of sounding an audible alarm or indicator, prior U.S. Pat. No. 2,113,521, to Torres, dated Apr. 5, 1938, discloses a pivoted target member seen upwardly through a sloping surface in a sort of hood-like manner, and when struck by a ball or the like, the target member actuates a certain type of clapper in a bell to cause an audible sound.
The present invention pertains to an amusement device attempting to capture some of the glamour of the old tin can target type of amusement in a manner which is different from the above-described patented structure, details of which are set forth below.